<?php
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$xhtml = array(
	'<{title}>' => 'Implications of the Internet',
	'<{subtitle}>' => 'Written in <span title="English Composition 2">ENGL 1102</span> by <a href="https://y.st./">Alex Yst</a>, finalised on 2018-03-07',
	'<{copyright year}>' => '2018',
	'takedown' => '2017-11-01',
	'<{body}>' => <<<END
<p>
	The main article I read was about the Internet itself.
	Partly, it was about the political issues surrounding it, as people seek to control use of it.
	Such control includes widely-known problems such as the Great Firewall of China, but it&apos;s not limited to governments.
	For example, our own university censors students in certain ways, restricting what we&apos;re allowed to spread on the Internet for as long as two calendar years after we graduate, as well as all the time we spend in the school.
	(Go read the code of conduct, if you don&apos;t believe me.)
	I choose to abide by the university&apos;s restrictions, but in the case of governmental restrictions, there&apos;s often very little or even no reason for citizens to go along with such noxious policies.
	Governments that seek to control use of the Internet must fight against what the Internet actually is: a way to quickly and easily transmit information to remote places and retrieve such remote information (Tkacheva, et al, 2013).
	Access to the Internet, at its core, is access to the world&apos;s supply of information.
	Putting up walls within that is incredibly difficult for those that try.
	The Internet, by its very nature, seeks to unite us all in freedom.
</p>
<p>
	The article also covered the reverse.
	Politics have an impact on the Internet, but the Internet also can also play a major role in political movements.
	Political movements have nothing without the offline bonds we share with people.
	However, the people we are close to are usually those with a similar life situation to our own.
	We don&apos;t cross class lines with out friendships often, nor do we cross national boarders frequently.
	What the Internet does then, in the case of political movements, is get information travelling between these groups of normally-separated people (Tkacheva, et al, 2013).
	It doesn&apos;t get us all caring about the same thing, but it gets us all <strong>*talking*</strong> about the same thing.
	With us all on the same page, the basic underlying things we all care about but don&apos;t often discuss in unison emerge.
	Using that, we unite across class boundaries and work together toward a common goal.
</p>
<p>
	One source cited by the author was an article about a train accident in China.
	China tried to cover the incident up, even going as far as to try to <strong>*literally bury*</strong> the wrecked trains using bulldozers (Branigan, 2011).
	They prevented the media from covering the event&apos;s negative implications, demanding that they instead cover the rescue efforts.
	Journalists were forbidden from investigating the cause, and were told it was an unavoidable accident caused by lightning.
	However, one citizen took the censorship issue to the Internet, causing it to spread globally.
	The world wasn&apos;t going to stand by and let this just be swept under the rug.
	The Chinese government, faced with the Internet, found itself unable to control how the event was understood.
	The world didn&apos;t have to believe the lies the government had to offer.
	Lightning was certainly involved, but it was corruption and lack of adherence to safety regulations that was likely truly to blame.
</p>
<p>
	Censorship isn&apos;t the only political issue entangled with the Internet either.
	Another is surveillance.
	The Internet spreads information.
	That includes information that private citizens don&apos;t want spread, and includes spreading it to governments that have no right to have it.
	However, the spread of information over the Internet in the form of whistle-blowing <q cite="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7249/j.ctt4cgd90.16">increase[s] the political and economic costs of repression</q> (Tkacheva, et al, 2013).
	The Internet and Internet freedom programs have a long way to go, but overall, the Internet is a very good thing and makes the world a freer place.
</p>
<div class="APA_references">
	<h2>References:</h2>
	<p>
		Branigan, T. (2011, July 25). Chinese anger over alleged cover-up of high-speed rail crash. Retrieved from <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/25/chinese-rail-crash-cover-up-claims"><code>https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/25/chinese-rail-crash-cover-up-claims</code></a>
	</p>
	<p>
		Tkacheva, O., Schwartz, L., Libicki, M., Taylor, J., Martini, J., &amp; Baxter, C. (2013). Key Findings and Policy Implications for Internet Freedom Programsʹ Design. In Internet Freedom and Political Space (pp. 203-222). SANTA MONICA, CA; WASHINGTON, DC; PITTSBURGH, PA; NEW ORLEANS, LA; JACKSON, MS; BOSTON, MA; DOHA, QA; CAMBRIDGE, UK; BRUSSELS, BE: RAND Corporation. Retrieved from <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7249/j.ctt4cgd90.16"><code>http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7249/j.ctt4cgd90.16</code></a>
	</p>
</div>
END
);
